Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Graham Bread
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the batter
Scald the milk and water in a pot, then remove from heat.
Add butter, sugar, and salt to the mixture and let it cool.
Stir in enough Graham flour until the batter is stiff.
Dissolve the yeast in ½ cup of water and add to the batter.
When the batter is light, stir in the dissolved baking soda. Do not add more flour.
Bake
Pour the batter into a long, deep tin.
Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) without opening the door until nearly done.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + coffeetop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,202 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + coffeetop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,442 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Graham flour
- Forms the main structure of the bread and absorbs the liquid to make the batter stiff.
- Yeast
- Produces gas that makes the batter rise and light before baking.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the batter to add further lift and a lighter crumb.
- Butter
- Adds fat for a softer crumb and richer flavor.
- Milk
- Adds moisture, softness, and browning from its milk sugars.
The step that matters
Do not open the oven door while baking. Opening the door drops the oven temperature and can cause the risen batter to collapse or bake unevenly, so the loaf may turn out dense.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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